A collection of top water news from around California and the West compiled each weekday. Send any comments or article submissions to Foundation News & Publications Director Doug Beeman.
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The current wet spell, made up of a parade of atmospheric
rivers, is a welcome change from the last three years of record
dry and warm conditions. For very good reasons, the focus
during these big, early winter storms is first and foremost on
flood management and public safety. There is of course also
great interest in the potential of these storms to relieve
water shortages for communities and farms. What is not always
appreciated is the role of these early winter storms in
supporting the health of freshwater ecosystems. For millennia,
California’s biodiversity evolved strategies to take advantage
of these infrequent, but critical high flow events. Benefits
from recent storms are now being realized throughout the state,
from temperate rainforests of the North Coast to semi-arid and
arid rivers in the south.
Even as a storms shower California with rain and snow, state
water regulators announced this week that they’re revisiting
their effort to protect Mono Lake from the ravages of drought,
agreeing to review how much water the city of Los Angeles is
taking from the basin and whether it’s too much. The
announcement, which has already begun drawing backlash from
Southern California, comes as the giant salt lake and
ecological curiosity on the eastern edge of the Sierra Nevada
has becoming increasingly dry in recent years. The freshly
exposed lakebed has been sending toxic dust into skies and
creating a land bridge to islands where hungry coyotes threaten
to prey on nesting birds.
More storms were expected to hit Northern California and the
rest of the state Friday, bringing fears of flooding, mudslides
and power outages in communities already battered by a series
of atmospheric rivers. All eyes will be on Monterey County as
officials warn that flooding could cut off the Monterey
Peninsula from the rest of the state and shut down major
roadways, including Highways 1 and 68. With more storms on the
way, the Salinas River region is forecast to receive 1 to 1.5
inches of rain Friday and up to 2 more inches over the weekend,
according to the National Weather Service. That could
swell the river to one of the highest peak flood levels in its
history.
At the end of last year, the seven states in the Colorado River
Basin committed to once again work together and negotiate a
consensus framework for making significant cuts to water use,
an attempt to stabilize the nation’s two largest reservoirs and
avoid an even deeper shortage crisis. The states recommitted to
considering a consensus deal, by Jan. 31, after several
deadlines passed in 2022 — with seemingly irreconcilable
differences over how to make painful cuts in a watershed relied
upon by 40 million people who use the river for drinking water
and agriculture. …… Of note was the comment letter from
Nevada, which outlined a possible framework to achieve
consensus. It was the only state-led letter that suggested a
comprehensive framework. In fact, two other letters
specifically refer to the Nevada plan as a starting point for
the state discussions….
No, California’s drought is not over, not by a long shot. But
weeks of near-constant rainfall have improved the situation
considerably, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor’s weekly
report released Thursday. The map updated Thursday shows most
of the state in moderate or severe drought after about seven
atmospheric river storms swept through the state since
Christmas Day. Only a small portion in the extreme northeastern
portion of the state remains in extreme drought, while the
northwestern corner of the state and much of Imperial County
dropped to the lowest level of drought, termed abnormally dry.
The Sacramento and Central valleys, which were in extreme and
extraordinary drought just three months ago, have seen
conditions improve to severe.
A group of Assembly Republican lawmakers gathered on a levee on
the American River in Sacramento to call out the state’s
Democratic leadership for failing to invest in water
infrastructure to aid with flooding and water
storage. Around 22 trillion gallons of rain will fall in
California according to estimates. However, state Assembly
Republicans blame the lack of infrastructure as the root cause
for why most of the water will go uncaptured. … In 2014,
voters supported a water bond that authorized billions of
dollars to go toward state water supply infrastructure and
water storage projects. Since then, no new reservoir or other
water project has been built.
In honor of their contributions to advancing water reliability
in Southern California, the Metropolitan Water District of
Southern California today named two facilities at Lake Mathews
in memory of former board Directors Lois B. Krieger and Donald
Galleano. Family, friends, local elected officials and
community members gathered to dedicate the naming of the Lake
Mathews Multi-Species Reserve in honor of Lois B. Krieger and
the Don Galleano Overlook at Lake Mathews. Both directors
represented Western Municipal Water District during their
service on Metropolitan’s board and also served
as commissioners at the Santa Ana Watershed Project
Authority.
All legislation aimed at regulating toxic PFAS “forever
chemicals” died in the Democratic-controlled US Congress last
session as companies flexed their lobbying muscle and bills did
not gain enough Republican support to overcome a Senate
filibuster. … PFAS are a class of about 12,000
compounds used to make products resist water, stains and heat.
They are known as “forever chemicals” because they do not
naturally break down, and they have been linked to cancer, high
cholesterol, liver disease, kidney disease, fetal complications
and other serious health problems. The Environmental
Protection Agency this year found that virtually no level of
exposure to two types of PFAS compounds in drinking water is
safe, and public health advocates say the entire chemical class
is toxic and dangerous.
Up and down the coast, they have endured torrential rain, flood
waters, mudslides, lighting strikes, and downed trees, often
with little more than tents or bridges for shelter. “The water
backed up to my tent, it’s still going,” said Maurice, who
lives in San Francisco and who declined to provide his last
name. “Ninety percent of my stuff is still wet. I’m trying to
salvage the stuff I do need to keep on going.” … The storm
has placed a spotlight on the Golden State’s staggering
inequality, and its decades-long failure to adequately shelter
and support its homeless residents.
California, with its serial atmospheric rivers, is grappling
with an unfolding natural disaster. Over the longer term, there
are many ways to reduce or mitigate risks from storms like
these, including promoting good land use planning and zoning to
avoid hazards, building infrastructure to better handle storms,
and ramping up efforts to address the greater vulnerabilities
of many low-income communities. But in the moment, one of the
most important risk mitigation strategies involves
communication. Communication is the lynchpin of disaster
preparedness and response. This includes raising awareness
about a storm’s potential consequences, encouraging safe
behavior, and enabling all-important communication during and
immediately after the storm.
The capital region has faced a series of brutal storms since
New Year’s Eve, which have flooded homes, cut power to
thousands of families and killed five people in Sacramento
County alone. California has sought to control its rivers for
173 years, and the storms will only get worse: The Department
of Water Resources has acknowledged that climate change has
intensified the risk of flooding in the Central Valley. The
state and federal government have built levees and dams, but
the possibility of a major flood remains. Here are some of the
worst storms to hit the Sacramento area since John Sutter
showed up.
Even in the middle of a cool and wet winter in the Coachella
Valley and California in general, officials of the Coachella
Valley Water District have a blunt message for the desert’s
golf course industry: Take the ongoing drought seriously,
because changes could be coming to water availability sooner
rather than later. … Golf course superintendents and
general managers from throughout the desert listened to
presentations on advances in drought-tolerant grasses and
technological advances that can help save water on the desert’s
120 courses. But Cheng and Pete Nelson, a director of the CVWD,
made the more important presentation on the state of the
Colorado basin and how water from the Colorado River can no
longer be counted on as a long-term solution to irrigation
needs for golf courses or agriculture in the desert.
Faced with ongoing drought, farmers in California have
sought ways to find a precious natural resource: water. In the
San Joaquin Valley, an area in central California known as the
breadbasket of the world, people have long bolstered the water
supply by pumping from underground basins. But experts say
people have been overdrafting groundwater for years.
Agriculture is a booming industry in California, employing
around 420,000 people across the state and supplying more than
400 different types of crops to consumers around the world. But
with limited access to water, and with rain and snow hard to
come by, reservoir levels are at record lows. Rivers have even
dried up.
Federal and state officials are outlining plans and soliciting
public comment for a potential concrete dam project in the
Medicine Bow National Forest. The dam would create a new
reservoir in the Colorado River Basin. Though the water storage
facility would be just 10,000 acre feet – much smaller than
other reservoirs in the region – the dam would still tower over
250 feet and block a wooded canyon on a tributary of the Little
Snake River, according to WyoFile. Building the structure would
cost around $80 million, according to a 2017 cost estimate of
the project and WyoFile, and the state would pay for the
majority of it. State Sen. Larry Hicks (R-Baggs) managed water
and natural resources in the Little Snake River Basin for 32
years and is in favor of the project.
The danger lurking along a country road in central California’s
wine country was not clear to Lindsy Doan as she drove her
five-year-old son to school on Monday morning. The region, like
much of the state, had been hit by a deadly series of storms
that were , but the family had traveled through the area the
previous day, her husband told the Guardian, and countless
times before on their commutes. … It only became clear
the road was not safe as floodwaters began to carry the vehicle
into a creek near the village of San Miguel. … The search is
one of several that has taken place across the state in recent
weeks as a devastating series of storms battered the state. The
rains and wind have toppled trees and power lines and flooded
rivers and creeks, killing at least 18 people, including
three in Sacramento county who were found dead in or near their
cars.
A New Mexico town that is intimately aware of the water supply
risks from a drying climate could receive up to $140 million to
rebuild its water system after the largest wildfire in state
history tore through its watershed last year. Besides being a
lifeline, the funds also illustrate the financial and
ecological vulnerability of small, high-poverty communities in
the face of extreme weather. In the fiscal year 2023 budget
that President Joe Biden signed just before the new year,
Congress set aside $1.45 billion for post-fire recovery in New
Mexico. That’s in addition to $2.5 billion that lawmakers had
already directed to the state, bringing the total amount of
federal aid after the Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon fire to nearly
$4 billion.
The Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Department of
Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service today
announced nearly $8 million for three Klamath Basin Salmon
Restoration grant programs is available. Partnering with the
National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to administer funds, the
agencies are now seeking applicants to submit pre-proposals for
funding opportunities of up to $500,000 for Klamath River
projects, up to $500,000 for Trinity River projects, and up to
$7 million for Shasta Valley projects. On Jan. 19, 2023, from 1
p.m. to 2 p.m. PST, Reclamation, NRCS, and NFWF will host a
joint pre-proposal webinar to provide an overview of each grant
program’s purpose and objectives …
Like it or not, adapting to climate change will involve human
beings retreating from places the weather has made too
dangerous for habitation. This will be easier to
accomplish in some places than others. On the
most difficult end of the scale sits California. In a
matter of weeks, the state has gone from being perilously
dry to drowning in “atmospheric rivers” of water falling
from the sky, in a series of storms likely to continue
for another week. Mud and rocks are pouring down
hillsides that recent wildfires swept clean of protective
vegetation. Storm surges are flooding the coast. -Written by Mark Gongloff, a Bloomberg Opinion
editor and writer.
A series of atmospheric river storms since Christmas has
significantly reduced California’s drought, the federal
government concluded Thursday. For the first time in more than
two years — since Dec. 1, 2020 — the majority of the state is
no longer in a severe drought, according to the U.S. Drought
Monitor, a weekly report put out by the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture
and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Overall, 46% of
California’s land area remains in severe drought, the report
found, a dramatic improvement over the past month, when it was
85% on Dec. 6.
The seventh atmospheric river storm since Christmas hit
California on Wednesday, and more flooding is possible as two
more are forecast through the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday
weekend, officials said. Speaking to reporters in hard-hit
Capitola, a beach town east of Santa Cruz devastated by storm
damage, Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday warned about more
destruction to come. By Wednesday, the number of confirmed
storm-related fatalities rose to 19. … Newsom previewed three
more atmospheric river-fueled storms, which should continue
through at least Jan. 18, meaning another week of rain, at
least for Northern California. Officials said numerous rivers
still could flood with the continuing rains.
